Standing in Another Man's Grave By Ian RankinLittle, Brown, 388 pp. * * * * out of four

Praise the lord, John Rebus is knee-deep in trouble again. To the dismay of many crime-novel fans, the Edinburgh detective retired in Rankin's 2009 Exit Music. We should have known that wouldn't be the end of him. He's back, although in a volunteer capacity, working on a cold-case team where his feisty and often very unpleasant demeanor is rankling the higher-ups who are burning brain cells trying to figure out how to get rid of him. But not before he gets mixed up in the case of a missing girl. In no time at all, Rebus figures out what the suits and uniforms haven't picked up on — there's a serial killer on the loose. One of the most dogged detectives to walk the earth, not just the Highlands, where much of this novel takes place, Rebus (with Rankin working his story line) is as incomparable as ever.

The popularity of modern British crime novels is legion thanks in part to Robinson's inimitable Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks of Yorkshire, star of 19 previous novels. This time, Banks investigates the murder of fellow cop Bill Quinn, killed with a crossbow on the grounds of a convalescent center where he was staying

. The first clue that something dodgy is going on comes with the discovery of some compromising photos in his room. From there, Banks looks for connections to an unsolved case from which Quinn never recovered, that of an English girl who went missing in Tallinn, Estonia, six years before. That gives Robinson the opportunity to make this an international mystery, taking Banks to a country not many of us have visited. Robinson rolls out a police procedural with exquisite precision. And if you're a U.S. fan, check out the British TV series DCI Banks airing on some PBS stations.

'Snow White Must Die' by Nele Neuhaus

Snow White Must DieBy Nele NeuhausMinotaur, 371 pp.* * *

The global reach of crime writers already famous in Europe is expanding far beyond the ubiquitous works of U.K. and Scandinavian writers. American readers can now enjoy this well-crafted novel from Nele Neuhaus, one of Germany's popular mystery writers. Tobias Sartorius, 30, paid the price after being convicted of killing two teenage girls whose bodies were never found. He's done his time but the residents of t

he small town where he grew up and where his father lives are far from welcoming. You can sense the townspeople are hiding something and Neuhaus builds the tension when another girl goes missing and Tobias is blamed. This novel is bursting with conspiracy and subterfuge and a raw exposition of the ugliness that can inhabit the human soul. Like detectives Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein, readers won't stop until the shocking ending is finally revealed.

Thanks to Downton Abbey, post-World War I England couldn't be a better place to set a novel. And Charles Todd, an American mother-son writing team, has been ahead of the curve for years. In this 15th novel starring war veteran Ian Rutledge, the dogged detective, still haunted by what he experienced in the trenches of Europe — it's apparent to us he's suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder — heads the investigation into the murder of an unidentified man found on a London street. A gold watch is the first clue Rutledge uses to steer the hunt for the man's identity and his killer. It's a complicated, very complex tale with an ever-expanding cast of characters and missing bodies. By the end you'll be gnashing your teeth anxiously waiting for the puzzle pieces to fall together and make sense of all that's come before.